Embraer, the feisty Brazilian aircraft maker, has won a huge victory worth tens of billions of dollars, crushing Bombardier, its beleaguered Canadian rival.

Since Embraer began producing E-Jets in 2004, it has received 1,500 orders from about 60 airlines in 48 countries. With top-sellers E175, E190 and E195, it has captured 62% of the regional jet market and is now consolidating that lead by spending US$1.7-billion to develop three more fuel-efficient variants of the E-Jet-E2. Test flights will begin next year at an airfield beside the company’s state-of-the-art factory an hour’s drive north of Sao Paulo, with first deliveries scheduled for 2018.

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There are many reasons for Embraer’s triumph in a market once closely contested with Bombardier. The biggest by far is its focus on jets seating up to 130 passengers after what Paulo Cesar Silva, president for commercial aviation, says was “a deep assessment” of whether it should build a 150- or 160-seat aircraft.

“We believed we could develop a very efficient aircraft, even more efficient than what the competitors were offering,” but after years of internal debate” our final decision was that we could not take a step toward a larger aircraft because the business plan was not there for it,” he said.

Courtesy of Embraer

Bombardier, which had considerable success selling its Canadair Regional Jet in the late 1990s, looked at the same numbers and projections. But the Mirabel, Que.-based company chose a totally different path. Seduced by the possibility of developing bigger aircraft, it put all its money into its revolutionary CSeries narrow-body, medium-range jet.

That strategy meant taking on the market leaders in that segment, commercial aviation’s two giants, Airbus and Boeing. It also left Bombardier with no money to develop new engines or wings for the CRJ — effectively surrendering the lucrative regional jet market to Embraer.

While the Canadian company has encountered repeated delays in getting its new jet in the air, Airbus re-engined its best-selling 320 plane, added Neo to the name and pitched it to existing customers at prices that undercut the CSeries. Boeing pursued the same strategy with a newer 737, the Max.

What Bombardier tried to do “redefines hubris,” said Richard Aboulafia, an aviation analyst and consultant with the Teal Group in Washington. What followed was “like two lions smiling at each other while they swallow an antelope.”

Meanwhile, Embraer effectively “reinvented” the top end of the regional jet market. But because it was “not going head-to-head with anyone, there was far less pricing confrontation,” Mr. Aboulafia added.

In the past few weeks alone, Bombardier has failed to win expected orders for the CSeries from Qatar Airways and Austrian Airlines. It has signed contracts for 243 aircraft. Airbus’s 320-Neo and Boeing’s 737-Max have bagged more than 5,000 orders.

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In the slightly smaller regional jet market, Embraer has more than 700 orders for the E-Jet-E-2 worth more than US$24-billion, Teal Group says.

“It is a huge challenge for a new manufacturer to penetrate into the narrow body market. It was clear that Boeing and Airbus were going to fight for that segment and would make it very difficult for a new entrant.”

Guillermo Marquina, a frequent visitor to Brazil who works for CM Labs Simulations of Montreal, which develops interactive three-dimension simulations for industry, said he was puzzled by the Canadian firm’s strategy.

While Bombardier still doing well in the private business jet sector, “what’s its target?” he asked. “Commercial aviation is much bigger and Embraer now has it. For Bombardier to have a chance in needs to get the CSeries going as soon as possible.”

With Brazil’s state oil company, Petrobras, mired in a US$1-billion corruption scandal and the currency, the real, plummeting, Embraer’s big export drive has become crucial to the country’s flagging economy — and its sense of national pride.

Canada has a well-managed government with a poorly managed national aerospace champion. Brazil is the exact opposite

“My deeply cynical thought coming out of Embraer was that you’ve got a mirror image [with Canada],” said Mr. Aboulafia, who visited the San Jose de Campos plant recently.

“Canada has a well-managed government with a poorly managed national aerospace champion. Brazil is the exact opposite. It is a poorly managed country with a very well-managed national aerospace company.

“The one part that works is Embraer. They need a contract to run Brazil.”

Success did not come easily for Embraer, which was established more than 50 years ago. Because Brazil was not noted for cutting-edge products, gaining the aviation industry’s respect and confidence required not only superior technologies but a prudent, generally risk averse philosophy and, as a company executive said, “listening very closely to what the customer wants.”

Matthew Fisher/Postmedia

On the shop floor at San Jose de Campos, where 10,000 of Embraer’s 19,000 workers are employed, painters, riveters and electricians clambered on and inside dozens of E-Jets in every stage of assembly. Finished products basked in the sun outside the giant construction bays, waiting to be flown to customers all over the world — the result of decisions taken 15, even 20 years ago.

Although Bombardier has painted itself into a corner, Embraer now faces new battles against emerging rivals from Japan, China and Russia, who have designs on a regional jet market Mr. Silva believes will require 6,400 aircraft in the next 20 years.

Teal Group forecasts total production of 3,018 regional air craft worth US$79.4-billion in 2014-23.

“We want to continue to the market leader,” Mr. Silva said. “How much we will continue to grow, in factories and employees, remains to be seen. But we will definitely grow.”